The president and his political appointees were the worst offenders when it came to mocking Romney’s clearly vindicated assessment of the threat posed by Russia. “The 1980s called, they want their foreign policy back,” Obama told Romney during a presidential debate. “Romney talks like he’s only seen Russia by watching Rocky IV,” Secretary of State John Kerry announced to a squealing crowed at the Democratic National Convention.

These and other dubious assurances are forgivable from the political class, but they are inexcusable coming from self-described members of the press. Their job is to determine accuracy or validity of the statements made by political actors in order to separate fact from fiction. That responsibility was abdicated by the personalities above in 2012 in defense of their preferred political outcome. That kind of behavior is so many things, but one thing it is not is journalism.

They're not journalists; and it's silly to even pretend otherwise; they're simply Democrat operatives with bylines, as Glenn Reynolds likes to say.